Thursday, January 27, 2011

My student Amrita doing some stunts: why this is very special to me


This is Amrita. When she came, she had a very delicate constitution, with embolism in her lungs. Though normally I would keep somebody with a chronic or severe problem like her in a therapy class, I invited her to join to normal one. And she has grown from strength to strenght:) When she started she would be intensely breathless. We had to wait for her body to acclimitize to exercise. I started with the gentle pawan muktasana series. Then she moved into the Sun Salutation and after a few weeks, when she went for her check up her doctor told her her oxygen intake had improved substantially. I think that must have convinced her how marvellously healing and repairing yoga is.. so now barring a few poses, where we are still waiting for her develop her breath capacity and her upper body stamina (usually rather weak in those with breathing problems) she does a lot of poses which will stump any advanced practitioner -- she does the bhumipadamastakasana, the head-touching-earth pose (u see in the ablum) and lots of other things that I have taught her as an alternative and which, often, stumps the rest of the class:) I am hoping the healing will be complete, with Swamiji's grace, and she can catch up with the crow, which she wants to hold far longer, and the ultimate in her dream list: the headstand!
Strength and courage in yoga often is a matter of the mind, as Amrita demonstrates..

8 comments:

Geeta said...

Wow! Kudos to Amrita and you, Shameem!

Love,
Geeta

YOGA IN EVERYTHING said...

Thanks Geeta:) But it is all Amrita's determination:) Plus the great surge of energy in the class -- her batch is very sattvic group! Nothing to do with me.

Anila said...

Good going Amrita! We are all proud of your determination!

sonia samtani said...

awesome amrita!!!soon we will be doing headstand together for 5 mins :)hats off to Dr.Shameem Akhtar


love
sonia

YOGA IN EVERYTHING said...

Hey, Sonia, what's with that Dr Stunt!!! U are determined to make me an egotistic behenji yoga teacher:)

Unknown said...

Thanks Sonia :-) headstand now looks achievable.. It's the scorpion and wheel that I'm eyeing now!!

sonia samtani said...

Mam since all my ailments disappeared after doing yoga wit u, calling u a doc was just a natural instinct.
Didn't intend anything else, will stop it :)
Love
Sonia

YOGA IN EVERYTHING said...

NO need to explain. I understand!